These are the horrifying things a nuclear war would do to the planet

The bomb blasts themselves would be devastating, but firestorms and radioactivity would do even more damage

Bloomberg News

A news broadcast on North Korea's nuclear test on Jan. 6, 2015.

By

JuricaDujmovic

Columnist

With the possibility of a nuclear war higher now than it was in the 1960s, talking about its destructiveness and consequences is an unpopular, but necessary, topic.

While it’s known that nuclear weapons can obliterate entire cities, eradicating millions of lives in the process, not enough has been said about the global, long-term effects.

So, what would happen exactly in the aftermath of a full-scale nuclear apocalypse? The current estimates, based on the model that simulated the effect of 100 nuclear explosions (each as powerful as the one in Hiroshima in 1945) on the climate, are rather bleak. Those who manage to survive the initial impact would soon find themselves in a world incapable of sustaining them.

Firestorms

The explosions would initiate firestorms, large and destructive fires that are so intense, they can create and sustain their own wind systems. Such winds can then fuel those fires indefinitely, while an intense updraft creates a funnel-like structure capable of spewing billions of tons of dust and soot into the atmosphere.

Wikipedia

How firestorms work — the structure of firestorm thermal column.

Once there, those particles would create a reflective and opaque layer that would make it hard for the sunlight to reach the planet’s surface. As a result, the entire planet would cool by about 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit, which would be remarkably similar to the 17th century’s Little Ice Age.

The problems wouldn’t stop there. If they floated to very high altitudes — up to 25 miles — dust particles would be protected from rain. In that case, it would take more than a decade for them to clear completely.

Lack of sunlight

During that period, because of an insufficient amount of sunlight that flora and phytoplankton need to thrive, plants and many crops would fail worldwide. This, in turn, would result in the decimation of animal life (both marine and land species) that feed on vegetation, causing food shortages and famine across the globe.

The lack of food sources would soon give rise to disease outbreaks, as the global population would suffer the effects of malnourishment. As the ultimate result of the full-scale shortage, chaos would ensue.

Radioactive particles

While one could argue that those effects would vary across the globe and that all parts wouldn’t be equally affected, we haven’t discussed radioactive particles contaminating existing food and water supplies. There’s also the destruction of the ozone layer that needs to be taken into account. The firestorm smoke would heat up the stratosphere by 50-100 degrees Celsius or more, and the resulting temperature-fueled chemical reactions would deplete the ozone layer to values now found at the perpetual hole in the ozone layer in Antarctica.

The massive increase in ultraviolet radiation would wreak further havoc on already decimated life forms on the surface.

One may think that all this could have already happened, what with numerous nuclear tests taking place; however, the above-mentioned effects aren’t the result of explosions themselves — they’re the byproduct of firestorms generated by detonations of nuclear weapons in cities.

The model assumes that all 100 nuclear explosions would result in firestorms. Although those findings aren’t new — in fact, earlier reports motivated global leaders to reduce their arsenals in the first place (here are the START and SORT treaties) — nowadays, the issue of nuclear warfare is rearing its ugly head again.

Hopefully, global leaders will acknowledge the warnings from the scientific community and refrain from mutual destruction when resolving international conflicts.

We, too, can make a difference by making sure our children understand the consequences, so when they’re in positions of power, they can make the right choices and rid the world of weapons that never should have existed in the first place.

Jurica
Dujmovic

Jurica Dujmovic is a business publisher, consultant,
designer and gamer.

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